ANC remains in the lead as over 70% of votes have been counted

Pretoria – The ANC still has a strong lead as over 70% of votes have been counted and declared.

On Friday morning at 7 am close to 12 million (75,29%) had been counted.

The ANC still has a lead nationally with 57,22%, the DA follows with 21,81% and the EFF has 10,08% of votes.

The IFP has the fourth spot on the results board with 2,91% of votes. The IFP took the spot late on Thursday when it surpassed the FF+ which now sits at 2,48%.

Provincially Gauteng, which had been largely seen as up for grabs for the opposition before the elections, now has the ANC in the lead with 53,28%, the DA sits at 24,57% and the EFF at 13,4%.

Only 55,79% votes have been counted in Gauteng, with large metros such as Johannesburg, Tshwane and Ekurhuleni with the slowest voter count.

The national results centre is expected to be a hive of activity later in the day as political parties arrive to crunch the numbers.

President Cyril Ramaphosa is also expected to visit the centre late on Friday morning on an official walkabout.

On Thursday, some smaller political parties were unhappy with their parties’ progress on the results board with some accusing the IEC of bias. The parties vowed to challenge the fairness of the IEC process in court but have yet to file papers.

The BLF, ATM SRWP and a number of other smaller parties formed part of a group that marched to the podium at national results centre on Thursday declaring their intention to challenge the processes.

The group has been accused of relying on various complaints that had been filed with IEC to champion their case for a possible re-run of elections.

The had been reports of possible voter fraud in some areas with some people claiming they had been able to vote twice. The IEC has insisted that it will investigate these claims.

It was also reported that 20 people had been arrested in KwaZulu-Natal for voter fraud.

The IEC has also promised that it will conduct an audit of votes in areas were possible voter fraud had been reported.